IPython Notebook ( http://ipython.org/notebook.html ) is a web based extension of iPython. It's very powerful and convenient and It allows you to mix code, annotation, text, figures into a single interactive document.

IPython is included in all of the most popular python distributions, like Anaconda , or Canopy. If you have one of those distributions installed on your computer, you can already start using the notebook.

Here a couple of hints on how to open a notebook on Mac and Windows:

Mac users

open a Terminal

cd into the folder where the notebook you would like to open is :for example:

start python notebook with the following command:ipython notebook yournotebook.ipynb

Windows users:

From the Programs menu click on the IPython Notebook icon, inside the Anaconda program folder.This will open a window in your default web browser.

Navigate to the folder where the notebook is and click on it.

In both cases ( Windows or Mac), after the notebook is loaded It should look something like this :